Tucson Gem, Mineral and Fossil Shows-Beads and G&LW

55 sunny

Gary at Caberlight sells his innovative LED lights.

A pleasant day but a bit cold (icy cold for the locals, T-shirt for me). We started at The Best Bead Show (that’s the name of it). I needed a couple new LED lights and Bonnie was in need of some supplies for kumihimo, a braiding material she has been playing around with. We were surprised to see that there were no outside tents like there was when we were here 2 years ago. We thought they might have expanded their space inside, but no, it turns out it was half the size of when we were there last.

Bonnie wanted to go there because this show has lots of seed beads, including new shapes that they keep coming out with. Who knew that those little things come in rectangles or triangles with two holes, or superduos or miniduos or rizos, or just plain o’s. Anyway, I was happy to find coffee and a bench, and she was happy to buy “stuff”.

The piles of beads abound.

After the Bead Show we hopped the Gem Show Shuttle over to the Wholesale Show at G&LW’s (Gem & Lapidary Wholesalers) giant tent, that I showed you on a previous blog. Really you are not suppose to photo anything, but I had a friend that took a couple; That’s my story anyway.

I was sitting in a “Guy Chair” waiting for Bonnie to get through this line.

These were really “Bling”. I did not enhance this photo.

The G&LW show has much buy/sell merchandise from China, India, Taiwan, Pakistan, Austrailia, and many other places with vendors being of many nationalities. I have trouble understanding many of them, and they sometimes have trouble understanding me, but they all understand CASH! Most dealers at this show take credit cards and/or checks. We stocked up on ribbon and leather necklaces and some other premade items. There are few rough rocks at this show other than faceting rough, so I can move pretty fast for a guy with a bad leg. Tables stacked with beads, with the Bead Ladies attacking them with a furor reminiscent of piranha attacking. It seems the more Bead Ladies at the booth, the more it attracts other Bead Ladies. The show was busy even though it was midweek. I took a picture of a line Bonnie stood in. What was nice was a handy corral of resting chairs in the next aisle, and I was not the only guy there!

Shiny beads seem to be the product of the day, both faceted, manufactured simulates, and true gemstones. Even I was able to recognize that there were many more shapes and designs than in previous years. Dealers were in full competition to attract CASH!

Skulls with their heads blown off like that add on TV.

One funny thing I saw were carved skulls but these were different in the top was blown off like the ad you see on TV where the top of people’s heads get blown off. I found some very nice Botswana cabochons and that was about all I bought.

Here are a few things from the shows the last few days. It pays to have a loupe and a light, as there are many surprises in some show treasures. Quartz with inclusions come from Mina Gerais, Brazil (AKA Lodelite), and often contain hidden treasures, if you can find them and you have the CASH!